Loudribs Curmudgeonry Corner Post Question Time Match Report #35

Good morning Lemmings and boy what fun have I been having with the Internet this week. To cut a long story short, I signed up with Google Webmaster Tools to try and find out how people arrive at this blog through searches and the results are somewhat… illuminating. Here’s a random selection of some of the more colourful search terms that visitors have used of late:

Lesbo lick

Big tit pervert

“my tits”

Big hairy bollocks

Shark tits

Drunk big tits

Super lesbian.

I must confess to being somewhat baffled by the emphasis on ‘tits’ and ‘lesbians’ as I’m pretty sure that neither of these words feature that regularly in my Post Question Time Match Reports (although I’ve probably just doubled their frequency by listing them here… more unsavoury search traffic plz), but who am I to argue with the omnipotence of google?

Enough of this and onto the matter in hand: Since I had so much fun last week turning Question Time into a marine tragedy I thought we’d keep it vaguely surreal this week and try to figure out what sort of pub this week’s episode would be and what sort of booze would represent each of the panelists. I know, I know, it clearly sounds like some straw clutching is afoot here, but let’s face it, this was a bollocks episode.

Health warning given, let’s start with Chris Huhne who I’ve always thought (with the addition of comedy teeth) would make a serviceable chipmunk impersonator (see Fig.1). It’s those big old cheeks of his: They just cry out to stuffed full of policy initiatives that can then be wheeled out in times of cognitive famine. Anyhoo, if Chris Huhne was to be a drink, I’m guessing he would be something along the lines of Directors Bitter. I say this because there’s nothing inherently offensive or unreasonable about him, it’s just that he’s hardly the most thrilling brew in the world, what with always being vaguely dependable but never really in the Zone of Excitement. Take this week’s performance: It was all pretty straight forward, ‘doing my best for the team’ sort of thing that never seemed in danger of ruffling any feathers (although his repeated banging on about how he used to be a journalist did grind my gears a little) and although he did seem to win the day over Chuka Umunna in the civil liberties question, it was such a protracted and well-behaved exercise in I’m Quietly Making A Pointery that I completely zoned out and nearly nodded off before I remembered that I’d agreed to buy a house the day before and had a complete ‘OH FUCK’ moment. Even the repeated open goals that Katie Hopkins so gracefully offered up were dealt with such understated peevedness that I wondered whether it might be worth getting a runner to check that he still had a pulse. So yes, that’s Chris: A thoroughly mundane pint that tries ever so hard to pretend it has a whiff of something special about it. Chris, you’re fooling no one.

Fig.1

Moving swiftly on we have Chuka Umunna who, by rights, should be a mojito. Think about it: He’s fresh, he’s got the looks (as Will Self pointed out in a rather disturbing episode of gushing) and he’s very Zeitgeist, ja? Well, unfortunately for Chuka there’s a small problem in that someone forgot to put the bloody rum in. All the other ingredients are there in that he appears cogent, clever and refreshingly young but the spark’s missing and as a result, his performance (like Huhne’s) was technically fine but ultimately sterile, particular for a week when the opposition were holding all the cards. Sort it out Chuka… There’s the makings of something great in you, but nice packaging and popularity with the in crowd will only get you so far. You need rum. Lots of rum.

Bringing up the rear of the party politicos we have Edwina Curry who I think may well be the subject of my earliest political memory: The Salmonella Crisis. Maybe it’s because it was on heavy rotation with John Craven’s Newsround or maybe it’s because I’m a massive egg fan (I REALLY like eggs. I can’t tell you happy I was when the ‘only 2 eggs a day’ rule was recently pooh-poohed), but for some reason the salmonella story has always been a very enduring memory for me. Anyhoo, in stark contrast to both Huhne and Umunna, Curry’s signature drink certainly isn’t lacking in the hard stuff and if I had to guess it would probably be a potent and slapdash combination of gin, blood, stomach pills and cranberry juice (please, don’t try this at home. Blood is quite difficult to get your hands on without receiving a call from your local mental health services). Technically, it wasn’t the best and we’re politically miles apart, but it had plenty of what the other two were missing and that’s vim (I even caught her air-punching at one point). Sure, it’s a little tart and long-term use would certainly lead to some pretty profound health risks, but hell, it gets you pissed and it seemed to work for John Major. Oh…. Ew.

Sally forth and we get to the non-politicos, the first of which is the ever vexing Will Self. Now, in drink terms he’s difficult because on the face of it, he seems very top-shelf, like some triple refined, 40 year matured boutique bourbon that you have to take a Coolness Test in order to buy. The packaging is reassuringly recondite, the marketing on your wave length yet when you actually crack the bottle open you don’t find bourbon. Instead, you find piss and vinegar. And that’s what annoys me about Will Self (as I’ve mentioned in the past): I totally agree with him. I want to like him. I want to be in his gang, but as soon as he opens his mouth all I can hear is the nails-on-blackboard sound of belittling and too-cool-for-school sarcasm dribbling down his chin. On paper, there’s nothing he said which I wouldn’t have totally endorsed myself but the manner in which he said it stripped away all the meaning and just left you with the acrid stench of self-satisfaction. So, I for one won’t be knocking back any of Will’s patented juice in the foreseeable future, what with it essentially being an overpriced and over-hyped measure of human waste and mouldy wine… But I’m sure it will be massive in Shoreditch.

Still with me? Well done. Here’s your reward: Ladies and gentlemen, I gave you Katie Hopkins, plumbing new depths in an already packed field that includes the like of Vorderman, McKenzie and Griffin. Trying to figure out what sort of drink she is turned out to be an exercise in simplicity and I arrived at the answer within a matter of seconds: Clearly, Katie Hopkins is a bucket of sick. Here’s why.

Equating everything to how it is in some way bad for small business in the same way that the Daily Mail equates everything to cancer/house prices.

Condemning near universally accepted civil liberties as somehow being a case of “terrorists over taxpayers”.

Scandalous deployment of the overly dramatic *sigh*

Accusing womankind of being in a “flap”.

“Cleggypoos”?

Having a pop at Karen Brady for being the leader of “the Sisterhood”.

And the real kicker: Claiming that “women couldn’t handle equal treatment if they got it”. Awesome. Well done, Fucknut. You thoroughly deserve the loudest torrent of boos since the fabled BNP encounter.

So yes. Katie is a bucket of sick. A bucket of sick with no redeeming features. Not a cocktail umbrella, not a straw. It’s not even fresh sick. It’s been in the bucket for weeks. Suck it up Katie, you’re an absolute monster.

Wow… that was kind of fun! Unfortunately, it is not to last as I now have the sad duty of now trying to figure out what sort of drinking establishment this Question Time would be. It’s a sad duty because it was a pretty poor show last night and miles away from the giddy heights of last week’s Burnley outing. So, Cambridge, it is with heavy heart that I decree your effort to be analogous with… a Beefeater Carvery (or to readers of a certain age, a Berni Inn). By rights, this should have been great week for Question Time as we’ve had phone hacking, double dipping and sexism, but somehow the combination of panel and crowd led to a stultifying mish-mash that looked like it really couldn’t be arsed. Ok, so people got a bit vocal when Hopkins started undoing centuries of work towards gender equality, but given just how awful she was, I think she got away with it lightly (she would have been tarred and feathered if it had been anywhere else). So yes, it was like a Toby Carvery: Somewhere where you’d never go by volition but end up obliged to on account of some unavoidable yet wanky social situation (the office Crimbo meal springs to mind). The food is heavy, the drink is flat, the toilet smells of pensioners and there is nothing to do to kill time except cramming multiple servings of the carvery down your throat in an effort to gain the maximum value out of your suffering. Bollocks to this, I’m off to get pissed.

TL;DR

Huhne: Yawn.

5/10

Umunna: Yawn.

5/10

Curry: Air-punch!

7/10

Self: Why?

4/10

Hopkins: Worst.Person.Ever

1/10 (a first!)

The Crowd: Kill me.

3/10

So there you go. As I mentioned earlier, I have actually just agreed to buy a house so I’m off to pace nervously and fret about interest rate. If you need me, I’ll be reading the Daily Mail.